Rain Taxi presents Ben Okri

Ben Okri, Booker Prize winning author, returns to the publishing world with two new publications for audiences across the spectrum of age and interest from Other Press. In a new imaginative environmental fable, Every Leaf A Hallelujah, Okri spins a wonder-filled adventure story, echoing climate activist Greta Thunberg’s message that “no one is too small to make a difference,” while Astonishing the Gods, originally released in 1995, is a genre-bending, imaginative novel (now including a new introduction penned by Okri) making a timely return — in 2019 the book was selected as one of the BBC’s "100 novels that shaped our world." Don’t miss this special event with one of the foremost African writers of our time!

Ben Okri is a fiction writer, poet, and playwright. He has published many books, including The Famished Road, which won the Booker Prize for Fiction in 1991. His other works include eleven novels, four books of short fiction, two collections of essays, and three volumes of poems. His works have been translated into 27 languages and he is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature; his books have won numerous prizes including the Commonwealth Writer's Prize for Africa, the Paris Review Aga Khan Prize for Fiction, and the Chianti Ruffino-Antico Fattore International Literary Prize. The recipient of many honorary doctorates, he is a vice-president of the English chapter of International PEN and was presented the Crystal Award by the World Economic Forum for his outstanding contribution to the Arts and to cross-cultural understanding. Other recent books include the novel The Freedom Artist, the short story collection Prayer for the Living, and the poetry collection A Fire In My Head. Born in Nigeria, Okri lives in London.